


Stitches

by TetrodotoxinB



Series: Whumptober 2019 [11]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Blood, Claustrophobia, Day 11, Knife Wound, Mentions of mental health problems, Needles, Panic Attack, Prompt: Stitches, Steve's heretofore unmentioned yet obvious PTSD, We should crowd fund therapy for these two, Whumptober 2019, field medicine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-07 22:11:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20983208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TetrodotoxinB/pseuds/TetrodotoxinB
Summary: Danny gets knifed. There are stitches without a local. The men talk about their emotions.





	Stitches

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by [Secret_Library98](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Secret_Library98/pseuds/Secret_Library98).
> 
> And before anyone thinks that this isn't a decent description of stitches without a local, I've been in Danny's situation (though with 100% fewer caves) and I vividly remember what that feels like. This is like the writers' version of method acting or something.

They’ve been running for almost five minutes and Steve thinks they might have finally given their pursuers the slip. It’s a good thing because it’s becoming evident that Danny can’t carry on much longer; he stopped muttering and swearing at Steve a couple of minutes ago and it doesn’t take a medical degree for Steve to know that Danny’s hurting.

They duck down into a copse of trees on the far side of a slope, and carefully, Steve lowers Danny to the ground.

“How you doing, Danno?”

Danny leans back against the tree, panting, and closes his eyes. “Hurts.”

“Yeah, I bet. Let me have a good look at it. Try to stay quiet,” Steve instructs in a whisper.

Danny nods and grits his teeth as Steve loosens the belt that he’d cinched down over the wound before their hurried escape. Danny’s hands bunch in the leaf litter on the forest floor and Steve tries to be gentle as he peels the blood-soaked denim from around the wound in Danny’s thigh.

“Well?” Danny grits out.

“Looks like a glancing blow. It’s more of a laceration than a puncture wound,” Steve explains.

Steve tears the fabric of Danny’s pant leg open around the wound and Danny breathes out hard through his nose at the pain of Steve jostling his wound. “That good or bad?”

“It’d heal either way,” Steve says.

“Thank you, Mr. Medical Professional, for that insightful commentary. I meant for out here,” Danny mutters.

Steve grabs his water bottle and uncaps it. “I’m going to irrigate the wound. It’s just water so it’ll probably sting a little but not too much.”

“Didn’t answer my question,” Danny points out. “We’ve got to keep moving. What are we gonna do? I can’t run on it much longer.”

And no, Danny really can’t. The more he exerts himself, the worse the damage becomes. Steve can see now that Danny’s got a deep laceration to the outside of his thigh — not too dangerous in terms of hitting major veins or arteries, but it’s still a serious injury to a major muscle group. Not to mention an infection risk if they don’t get it dressed soon.

“No, I know you can’t Danny. We need to get to somewhere secure where we can bed down and wait for backup. But while we wait, we’re gonna need to treat it to keep it from getting infected,” Steve explains. 

Danny opens one eye and pins Steve with a withering glare. “I’m not going to like that, am I?”

Steve shakes his head and moves to retighten the makeshift tourniquet. “No, Danny. You’re probably not.”

*****

It’s not far to the cave that Steve has in mind.

“Everywhere we go is someplace you remember from ‘hiking with your dad.’ Did you just search the island in a grid pattern for strange geographical features? Did your dad quiz you on them to make sure you remembered all of them? Did you have to draw a topographical map of the entire island before he’d let you graduate kindergarten?” Danny grouses as they stagger up a hill together.

“We just did a lot of hiking off trail when I was a kid. I loved it,” Steve explains feeling a little defensive. He doesn’t have many good memories from when he was a kid and sometimes it stings a little when Danny picks at what little happiness he had. 

“Oh, so like any other normal kid with normal hobbies. Got it,” Danny gripes.

Steve adjusts his arm around Danny’s waist where he’s doing his best to bear at least some of Danny’s weight. “Look,” he says pointing. “That’s the mouth of the cave.”

“Oh God. I’m going to crawl in there and the ceiling is going to collapse and we’re going to die in there, aren’t we?”

Steve hasn’t forgotten Danny’s claustrophobia, but right now the very real chance of high-velocity lead poisoning is a more pressing concern. “No, the cave is an old lava tube. Some of the most solid rock on the island. It’s small, but it’s not coming down anytime in our lifetimes.”

“Yeah, ‘cause when it collapses we’ll be dead,” Danny grumbles.

The first few feet of the cave are strewn with leaf litter and animal droppings, but farther in the cave floor is mostly clear of debris. The floor is damp and smooth, water having eroded any rough patches over the millenia. Finally, they come to rest about twenty feet in where the roof is nearly tall enough for them to stand.

Danny leans back against the wall and closes his eyes. He’s breathing hard, harder than he ought to be given the ease of their passage into the cave. Steve has known that Danny has panic attacks, though Danny’s always been careful not to have them around Steve. Now, though, Steve can’t help but catalogue the signs. Danny’s hands shake and he’s breathing like he just ran a five-minute mile. Steve aims his flashlight at Danny’s neck, and he can see Danny’s pulse, just under the skin. He’s clearly tachycardic which by itself isn’t great, but combined with an open wound it’s cause for concern. There’s also the fact that the tourniquet has to come off sooner rather than later or they risk permanent damage to Danny’s leg due to oxygen deprivation. It’s a lose, lose situation and Steve’s not at all happy about it.

“Danny, I need to look at your wound, okay? I know you’re having a hard time. You just concentrate on slowing your breathing and let me take care of everything else.”

Danny nods shakily but doesn’t open his eyes. Steve tries to release the tourniquet with as little jostling as he can, but Danny still twists away from the pain and groans, his voice echoing in the small spaces of the cave.

Quickly, Steve dispenses with the wrapping and again peels back the fabric of Danny’s pant leg. It looks clean and seems to mostly have stopped bleeding. But everything needs to be completely clotted before he starts to suture, so Steve sets his pack aside and sits down next to Danny.

“I think I was six or seven when Dad and I found this cave. I’d just gotten a guide about ‘The Plants of Hawaii’ for Christmas and I’d been bugging him non-stop for weeks to take me out so I could use it since I’d already identified every native and non-native plant in the whole neighborhood. Mary was just a toddler so she stayed with Mom, and Dad took off a couple of days from work. 

“In the four days we were out here, we must have covered every square inch of the whole preserve. I probably could have made that topographical map you were joking about earlier,” Steve recalls with a laugh. “Out of the three nights we camped, we spent two of them in here. Dad and I explored this cave for hours, just checking the place out. It’s a pretty extensive system, a lot of it has been widened over the years due to water. I remember every year, asking him to come back out here, but we never got around to it.”

It’s a bittersweet memory and for a moment, thoughts of John, especially thoughts of his last moments, make Steve’s chest _ache._ But the point of the story wasn’t to dwell on the past, it was to bring Danny out of his own head and into the moment. Steve turns his attention to Danny and listens to his breathing. Though it’s still tight and shallow, it’s evened out and slowed down quite a bit.

“You ever go see the active volcanoes with him?” Danny rasps out between breaths.

Steve swallows and shakes his head. “No, though we always talked about it. Work always seemed to get in the way.”

“That’s- that’s not great, babe. Work is never as important as your kids.”

Steve shrugs, knowing Danny can’t see him. “He was a detective. It was important work.”

“Right, I am aware of this given that I, too, am a police detective. However, barring actual lives being at risk, how often do I back out of plans I have with my kids?” Danny asks. 

Steve tries to focus on the fact that Danny’s voice is getting steadier bit by bit, and ignore the knife in his own chest that says his father didn’t love him the way Danny loves Grace and Charlie. “You never back out on your kids, Danno. You’re a great father.”

Danny nods and waves his hand definitively as he says, “Of course, I’m a great father.” And then more quietly he adds, “I’m sorry John wasn’t there like he should have been.”

Steve swallows because now is not the time to examine his own unhealed hurts. “Let me check your leg again.” Putting the flashlight back in his mouth, Steve peers closely at the wound, but he can’t see anymore bleeding. “It’s clotted.”

“That’s good, right? I’m not going to bleed to death in some uncharted lava tube only to be eaten by the mole people, or whatever it is that Jerry is always talking about?” Danny asks.

“Basically,” Steve agrees. “It also means it’s safe to suture it, which we really ought to do. The longer you have an open wound, the higher your chances of infection.”

“This is going to be the part you said I wouldn’t like, isn’t it?” Danny grumbles.

Steve starts pulling supplies out of his backpack. “Afraid so. I have a suture kit, but lidocaine is a controlled substance and I’m not a medic.”

“So you don’t carry any,” Danny says matter of factly.

“Sorry, Danno. You’re just gonna have to tough this one out.” Steve knows what it’s like to get a wound dressed in the field, nothing for the pain and the knowledge that he’s got to get back up and keep fighting. He doesn’t envy Danny’s situation.

Mindful of their supply of potable water, Steve wets a piece of gauze and carefully cleans around the laceration so that he can see what he’s working with.

“I hate you and I hate this cave and more than anything I hate stupid people with stupid knives,” Danny grouses as Steve works.

“It still looks clean so I’m only going to rise it a little,” Steve informs Danny.

Danny’s already bunched fists press against the volcanic rock and his face scrunches even before the Steve pours the water. It doesn’t take much to wash away some of the dried blood from the wound, but the stinging that Steve knows accompanies that action is enough that Danny’s already rapid breathing picks up again.

“Alright, I’m gonna start suturing. Do you want something to bite down on?” Steve asks.

Danny huffs. “Do I want something to bite down on? What kind of question is that?”

“An honest one,” Steve shoots back, as he tugs on latex gloves. 

Danny holds out his hand and wriggles his fingers in the universal sign for “give it here.” Steve fishes the carefully rolled paracord from the bag and passes it over.

“Really? It smells like fish and salt,” Danny says with a grimace.

“Well, if you remember I did fall off the dock a few hours ago,” Steve points out, laying out more supplies.

“And you’re going to give me some tropical fish disease when you sew me up with the water-logged first aid kit,” Danny complains loudly.

Steve tears open the needle driver and sets it next to the suture kit. “The entire first aid kit is water-tight. It’s still sterile.”

Danny mutters something that sounds suspiciously like, “I don’t believe you,” but Steve doesn’t bother replying, instead gripping the needle with the needle driver. 

“I’m going to start in the middle and work my way out. I’m not gonna lie, Danny, this is gonna hurt. You ready?”

“Oh, shut up,” Danny grumbles. He doesn’t put the paracord in his mouth, but Steve notices that Danny doesn’t put it down either. 

“Okay, first stitch,” Steve warns. He uses the fingers of his left hand to press the edges of the cut together and then pushes the needle into Danny’s skin.

Danny flinches hard when Steve puts pressure on the wound. When Steve, punctures his skin, Danny yelps and twists his torso away, though he carefully doesn’t move his leg.

“Breathe, Danno,” Steve says softly.

“What do you think I’m doing over here?” Danny rasps.

“By the sound of it, holding your breath,” Steve answers as he loops the thread around the end of the needle driver and pulls.

“Ow! I am breathing. If I wasn’t breathing then I couldn’t talk,” Danny snaps.

And yes, Danny is breathing. But it’s shallow and uneven, breaths coming at odd intervals which will only serve to send his anxiety spiralling if he doesn’t get it back under control. “You’d do better if you counted your breaths. Four in, hold for four, out for-”

“Steven, I have- Fuck!” Danny shouts as Steve places another stitch. “Fuck,” he says again, this time without shouting. “Look I have been breathing my entire life and I am not about to stop now. I do not need you or anyone else telling me how to complete a basic bodily function. I am forty years old.”

Steve ties off the stitch and starts another before asking, “Does Grace have it, too?” 

“Does Grace have what?” Danny mutters, gently pounding the floor of the cave with outside edges of his fists.

“Anxiety. Panic attacks,” Steve clarifies.

From the corner of his eye, Steve sees Danny’s eyes track to him in the dim glow of the flashlight. “Why would you ask that?”

Danny flinches hard as Steve pushes the small curved needle through Danny’s skin again. 

“Anxiety is heritable.”

“So, what? You think my poor genetic stock infected my daughter?” Danny snaps.

“No, Danny. I don’t think there’s anything to be ashamed of with mental illness-”

“I’m _not_ mentally ill,” Danny says, and Steve can hear the anger in his voice. 

“It’s not a character flaw, Danny. Some people have depression, or anxiety, or phobias. Some even have more serious conditions like schizophrenia. It’s just a condition,” Steve replies steadily.

“One that you wouldn’t know anything about,” Danny mutters.

“I have ADHD and after Dad died, I’ve struggled with PTSD. It’s not like I don’t understand. I’m in the same boat, Danny.”

The stunned silence that follows makes _Steve’s_ anxiety ratchet up. He meant to ask about Grace, to find out how Danny helps her deal with it, to bring up something to take Danny’s mind of the cave and darkness and the pain. Instead, he’s telling Danny things that he’s only ever talked about in therapy, and those appointments have been few and far between. 

“How bad?” Danny asks quietly.

Steve pulls the needle through Danny’s leg before answering. “After Dad? Pretty bad. I mean, I was probably headed that way anyway after Freddie. I only lost him a few days before Dad. But nightmares, insomnia, not quite flashbacks but like a constant video replay of it all in my head. I was pretty depressed and got on some strong antidepressants there for a while.”

“You never said.” It sounds like an indictment, like a betrayal. Danny gave Steve so much upfront — about Grace, about Rachel, about who he is and what he missed in moving to Hawaii. Steve intentionally played his cards close to the vest.

“In the SEALs any type of psych meds were grounds for dismissal. Folks who struggled learned to do it off the books and keep quiet. I just… I’d just come home from active combat.” 

“You didn’t think you could trust me.”

Another stitch and Danny barely flinches this time. Steve can feel the way that Danny’s gaze bores into the top of his head. “I wanted to.”

Danny looks at his lap and nods. “I believe you.”

Steve nods but doesn’t say anything. 

“Jesus Christ, Steven. What was that?” Danny shrieks when Steve places yet another stitch.

“I don’t know, Danno. There must be a larger nerve there. Maybe the skin is more sensitive. Sorry.”

Danny waves a hand. “‘Sorry.’ Right. You know, you are deranged. What did the Army do to your brain, huh? Poking people with needles like some weird home-ec assignment. You are not normal, you know that?”

Steve grins. “Yeah, you might’ve brought that up a few times before.”

“Yeah, well clearly it hasn’t done anything to change your opinion on civilized behavior so I guess I’ll just have to keep saying it.”

“Yeah, probably will,” Steve agrees.

The thread in the first suture kit is running down and Steve can feel the increased resistance as the needle dulls. When he pushes the needle in again, Danny flinches silently and then takes a moment to breathe before asking, “So how many more are there?”

“Well, that was twelve, and I just finished the first half.”

“I hate you so much,” Danny informs Steve for the second time.

“I know.” 

Steve discards the remaining few inches of thread and opens the next kit. “So you never did answer me about Grace and Charlie.”

Danny sighs. “You’re the worst. No, they do not have anxiety. Besides being entirely too intelligent, it’s the one thing where I’m grateful that they take after their mother.”

Steve grasps the new needle with the needle driver. “Mary took after Mom and Dad in a lot of ways. She’s smart and capable and adaptable, but she’s also anxious. I think for our parents, that anxiety helped keep them alive. But it’s like Mary got a double dose of it. She overthinks every relationship that she has and it ruins things, and then she gets in bad situations because everything else around her has fallen apart, or at least she thinks it has. I guess in a way I got that, too. I mean, it works for me, though. It’s just different. So I mean, I wondered about them was all,” Steve explains.

“No, Grace… she’s everything good about either of us without all the weird neuroses. And Charlie, I’m still getting to know him but I think he’s going to be a better person than me.” 

Steve can’t help the way he feels hurt every time Danny talks about Grace or Charlie. His parents never looked at him with the same pride that Danny looks at his kids, never bragged on them, never really made time in their lives for him and Mary, not the way Danny does almost every single weekend.

“So how do you manage the anxiety, then?” Steve asks, turning the conversation back to safe territory.

“I don’t go underground or get trapped in small spaces. So far it’s been a pretty solid strategy. Of course, then I met you and every other week I’m getting stuck somewhere that I don’t want to be.” 

“Oh, it’s not that bad, Danny,” Steve counters. He knows that what he’s saying is going to piss off Danny, but Danny needs the distraction. He’s quieting down, his breathing, which had been even and full, is starting to go tight again. 

“When we get out of here, I am going to hurt you,” Danny retorts.

“Like you could catch me.”

“Is that a joke about being stabbed in the leg?” Danny shoots back.

“No, it’s a joke about your old man knee. If you wanna catch me you should go ahead and get your cane ready,” Steve explains, fully expecting the angry hand waving and ranting that follows.

From there it’s just a matter of poking the bear over and over again, keeping Danny just riled up enough to avoid another panic attack. By the time the stitches are over and the wound is dressed, Steve’s sat phone, which he left just inside the mouth of the cave where he could still get service, has begun to ring. 

“Medevac is inbound and the team has boxed in Aguilar’s boys. We should be clear to head to exfil in another fifteen minutes,” Steve reports back once he’s talked to Chin.

Danny gripes the entire time while they’re climbing out the cave and then once they’re hobbling to meet the helo, but it doesn’t really bother Steve, never has. And Danny for his part, seems like he’s doing pretty well out in the open. 

They sit, leaning against a tree at the edge of the field waiting on medevac. “So, I feel like this trip was a good team building exercise. You wanna go hiking together when your leg heals up?”

Danny turns his head to glare at Steve. “Why don’t we just cook some steaks on your grill and we can talk about your feelings without me having to be stabbed first?”

Steve chuckles. “Alright, but you’re buying the beer.”

“Fine. I always do anyway.”


End file.
